Sharron supports the proposed minimum learning period but said: “We need the post-test safety precautions as well.”<\/p>\n
The driver, Skye Mitchell, who was also killed, had passed her test four months earlier. <\/p>\n
Sharron believes Caitlin “would still be here” if the UK had graduated driving licences which forbade newly qualified, young drivers from carrying passengers their own age.<\/p>\n
“All the girls [in the car] were 18,” she said. <\/p>\n
“This is the strongest element of a graduated driving licence that would save many young lives.”<\/p>\n
The AA has welcomed the measures announced by the government, but said not introducing GDLs was “a missed opportunity”.<\/p>\n
Its president Edmund King told the BBC that “all the evidence, from Australia, from Canada, from other countries” shows that limiting the number of same-age passengers in a car for six months “will save lives”.<\/p>\n
He said of the learning period: “That will help, but the question is: does it go far enough?”<\/p>\n
The road safety strategy will also include proposals for a lower drink-driving limit in England and Wales, to bring them in line with Scotland. Novice drivers would have an even lower limit, which is already the case in Northern Ireland.<\/p>\n